


Pulse and Haze

by scarvenrot



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Film Noir, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2012-01-02
Packaged: 2017-10-28 16:51:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/309979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarvenrot/pseuds/scarvenrot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karkat Vantas is a down-on-his-luck rookie Private Eye, trying desperately to break into the business of vigilantism after miserably failing to become a cop. For over a year he's been trying to find work in quiet Alternia, where next to nothing ever seems to happen...until one day when a young woman named Aradia Megido vanishes without a trace. Answering a plea for help from lifelong friend Kanaya Maryam, Karkat is pulled deep into the dark, hidden underbelly of Alternia--a place full of fearless gangsters, drugs, murder, and angry cops--as he tries to figure out what happened to Aradia before she vanishes for good.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Prologue**

She doesn’t wait for him to light her cigarette for her. It takes him way too long to fumble in his pockets for a lighter, finding a new hole first instead and cursing at it under his breath while she just sighs in exasperation and pulls a book of matches from the end table beside her parlor chaise. She strikes one and lights her cigarette in its holder, kissing it with more than just an air of elegance as she shakes the match out and lays it in a nearby ashtray. He glances up at her again as she exhales, realizing his faux pas, and she gestures for him to take a seat as she does. He chooses to remain standing, slowly pulling a weathered memo pad out of his pocket with a pen clipped to it. His bandaged knuckles bump his lighter, and he scowls down at the paper, angry with himself.

“Tell me about your friend, Miss Maryam.”

She folds her slender, stocking-clad legs, one knee over the other. She’s a tall woman, lithe, with hair cut close to her face that accentuates her almond-shaped eyes. Perhaps that hasn’t been the style for twenty years or so, but she makes it work. A little curl of hair sticks to her forehead near her right eyebrow, perfectly rounded. She looks at her guest intently, and it’s only then that concern and sadness are allowed to touch her features.

“You know that you can call me by my first name, Mister Vantas.”

“Well ain’t that a fantastic fucking double standard.”

“Karkat.”

“This is serious, Kanaya. Let’s try to be professional, shall we?”

“I am well aware of the gravity of the situation,” Kanaya Maryam says, taking another drag from her cigarette. “I called you here because I understand that this is very serious. I wouldn’t have asked anyone else for help with this, and as a matter of fact, I haven’t. I would like for you to not be so stiff and formal with me when I’ve extended a hand to you in trust and affection, Karkat. We’ve known each other since we were young, after all. Treat me like you know me. That’s all that I’m asking you.”

Karkat Vantas looks at his oldest friend, and then quietly moves to sit in the chair opposite her chaise lounge, resigned. He, unlike her, is short, stocky, and wearing clothes that are a size too big for him and well-worn with patches. His thick eyebrows twist into a knot above his wide, bloodshot eyes, moving so forcefully that his hat flinches on his head, and he frowns at her, pen lain down over the memo pad in his lap. He reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out a cigarette of his own, lighting it quickly. Kanaya looks down at her hand, not even noticing his now-found lighter.

“…Aradia disappeared about four days ago. Sorry. Miss Megido. I noticed because her article wasn’t in the paper this week, and then when I called on her for lunch on Tuesday, she didn’t answer. Her neighbors said that they hadn’t seen her in a day or two, but that’s normal for her. She’s always cooped up lately, it seems.”

“If that’s normal, how do you know for sure that she’s missing? Maybe she’s just sick.”

“She would have called.”

Karkat grunts, writing things down. “And what about this article?” he asks, trying not to sound too agonized. He likes Kanaya, genuinely: she’s a fine dame, a standup gal, but damn if she isn’t all about _books_ , and _reading_ , and incredibly dull shit like that. Her apartment is full of books. She’ll get on Karkat for not already knowing this girl’s ins and outs if she’s a regular contributor to the local paper, especially considering the nature of his assignment. Or at least, he expects her to. But she merely glances at him.

“In the _Times_. She wrote a freelance piece about the construction of the new park downtown. Or at least, she was working on it. She told me last week that she was going to have it submitted in time for publication this week, and I told her that I’d take her out to lunch to celebrate. She wants to be a real journalist, you see.”

“Ah.” Karkat scribbles down a few more notes—mostly dates—before he puts his pen back down in his lap. Kanaya blinks at him slowly.

“I know for a fact that she didn’t go on vacation. She doesn’t have the kind of money that would take right now. She has no family to visit, and if she was staying with a friend, she would have let me know who it was by now. We have most of the same friends, and the ones I don’t know, she’s told me about.”

“ _I_ don’t know this broad,” Karkat murmurs, writing things down again. Kanaya puffs smoke.

“Have a little class, please.” She reaches up to smooth her already perfect hair down. “I’ve already called a few of our friends looking for her, in fact, and she hasn’t been by to see them either, but you may want to talk to them yourself. I’m absolutely positive that something must have happened to her.”

“Uh-huh.” Karkat stops scribbling, looking up at her. “I ain’t complaining or anything, but is there some reason why you’re not calling the cops to ask them for their help with all this shit, Kanaya?”

“The police would be of no help to me. As I’ve told you already, I called you to ask for your assistance because I trust you. I know that you have the potential to find out what happened to her, and if you succeed in this case, undoubtedly it’ll earn you some publicity that will help you jump-start your career. I haven’t a single doubt in my mind that Aradia will write an article about this whole experience once it’s over and done with, too, and that will be great exposure for you. You know. Your name in the paper, and everything.”

“Yeah, ‘cause so many people read the _Times_ ,” Karkat mutters sarcastically. “So you’re doing this because you feel sorry for me, right? I don’t need a pity case, Kanaya. I mean, thanks for the opportunity and everything, but if I wanted to have someone jerk me around, I’d go walk by the police station. I’ll find your girl for you and all, don’t get me wrong, but so help me if this is just some stupid scavenger hunt that you’ve set up for me to go on…some wild goose chase with no real prize at the end but some cute story in the paper that’s supposed to make everyone feel good and have a laugh at my fucking junior investigator skills, then please tell me now, because I will lose my temper so fast that I won’t be held accountable for my actions afterward. They’ll give me a lobotomy, I’ll be so dangerous. I swear to fucking God.”

“Please don’t. It’s so uncouth,” Kanaya sighs. “It really is charming how threatening you think you are, though.” She smiles softly at him, her weird jade lipstick oddly flattering against her pale olive skin and her perfectly white teeth. “But I assure you this is no practical joke, Mister Vantas. I am paying you to do this, after all, and a fee which is not entirely inexpensive, even for someone like myself. I’m having you do this because I need help. I have faith in you, and I’m counting on you to return my friend safely to me. Can you do that for me, Mister Vantas?”

Karkat looks up at her. He would never turn her down, even if he knew that this was, for a fact, some ridiculous scam that she’d set up to humor him. She knows as well as he does that he’s never had a real, successful case before. And if this is real, she’s right: this could be the break that he’s been waiting for. His chance to become a real private investigator, no longer laughed at by the likes of rookie cops who think they’re so great, who happen to have passed their exams at the police academy with flying colors. He’ll show them. He’ll investigate this, and become someone important. He can find Aradia Megido. No fucking problem. No sweat.

He sighs heavily and raises his pen again. “I’m going to need the names of all of your mutual friends, Kanaya.”

She smiles wider at him. When he leaves, there’s still a smudge of jade lipstick on his cheek, in spite of his best efforts to wipe it away with his handkerchief.


	2. Karkat Vantas, Private Eye

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Karkat Vantas tries to rub his new case in an old rival's face, only to have it backfire on him miserably.

**Karkat Vantas, Private Eye**

Things like this don’t happen in Alternia. Not in this way, anyway. There are domestic disturbances, of course, but nothing like disappearances, or murders, or potential kidnappings. People will have disputes amongst themselves—a husband and wife will quarrel, pots and pans and plates will be thrown, or a fight will break out in the bar on Beech Street—but it’s only once in a blue moon that someone is genuinely in trouble, at least enough so to merit a police investigation. Karkat personally believes that the police in this town are a joke because of that: they spend nearly ninety percent of their time sitting in the station sipping their coffee, and the other ten percent pulling cats out of trees and directing traffic. And yet they still have the gall to mock people who think that they can take care of problems themselves. Why waste taxpayers’ money on a police force that’s unnecessary when people could make a decent living off of private investigation, though? People here didn’t even bother to bootleg during prohibition. There’s literally nothing to need police for.

This has absolutely nothing to do with Mister Vantas’s terrible grudge against the police force as a whole. Not a single thing.

Karkat walks the ten blocks from Kanaya Maryam’s apartment to the police station, his memo pad full of his notes and burning more of a hole in his pocket than a thousand dollars would. It’s a dismal winter day, and his clothes are thin, but he’s used to it by now. Even though the station is four blocks out of his way, it’ll be worth it to rub this case in that rookie cop Captor’s face. This really could pan out into something big: maybe even the first real scandal in Alternia’s history! And Captor will be jealous. Oh, so jealous. Karkat almost smiles until he remembers that he still thinks that Kanaya might be pulling his leg. He’s known her nearly all his life, and while she’s been genuine when it counted, she’s also gone out of her way before to try to humor Karkat when she shouldn’t have. It’s made him angry before, but she keeps doing it, still. He doesn’t doubt that she would do it again in yet another misguided attempt to make him happy. Karkat scowls to himself and shoves his hands into his pockets, turning the corner onto 4th Street. The POLICE sign is as ominous as ever, and he keeps walking toward it, even as he’s starting to get the feeling that he knows exactly what’s coming. He’s anticipated this sort of thing before, after all.

He stares up the stairs toward the glass doors that lead into the station, and he thinks. Going inside to boast about how wrong a cop and his annoying assistant were seems a little unwise, though it would be rather satisfying. Maybe just walking by the station in the off chance that one of them will poke their aggravating heads out to see him passing by would be better. Surely they’ll mockingly ask the question that they always do. Karkat nods to himself, choosing the wiser option, and he continues down the sidewalk slowly, peering up at the station’s windows. Officer Captor’s blinds are open, at the very least.

Karkat tries to make it look like he’s not spying, and he  buries his hands in his pockets, shuffling along the sidewalk. What he isn’t anticipating is the patch of black ice that he shuffles right onto and skids along, losing his balance immediately and crashing painfully to the ground, right under Officer Captor’s window. Inside, moments later, the blinds shoot up as Karkat is cursing and groaning on the hard sidewalk. In spite of the cold, the window flies open, and a young woman with messy, bobbed hair and catlike sunglasses sticks her head outside, smirking.

“Do I smell a foul-mouthed rat?” she asks in a slightly nasal voice, tilting her head in Karkat’s direction but obviously not looking straight at him. “There’s no loitering allowed in front of a police station, Sir.”

“Get over yourself, Terezi, I was just passing by!” Karkat groans, pushing himself quickly back up onto his feet. The girl, Terezi, lets out a mocking little gasp and leans her elbows on the window sill, resting her face in her palms dreamily.

“Why, it’s my favorite junior super sleuth! Fallen right into my lap! Tell me, Karkat Vantas, Private Eye, have you found any lost puppies in the time since we’ve last seen each other? Missing buttons, perhaps? Have you discovered what’s been eating Mr. Strider’s trash every Tuesday night?”

Karkat scowls up at her, even though she can’t see it, brushing the seat of his pants off angrily. Now is his opportunity. But maybe he can let her make an ass of herself just a little more. She continues to grin at him in that ugly way: like she knows she’s better than him, he thinks, and she’s always been like that, or at least as long as Karkat has known her. Every time she did better on a test at the academy in spite of her disability, that grin would be there, rubbing salt in his wounds. She can’t even see him, but she’s always known just how to get under his skin.

Karkat grunts. “Is Captor on duty?”

“He’s out patrolling the school zone. We can’t have the kids jaywalking, you know.” That snide lilt is still there, unmasked by her sudden tonal shift. She moves her chin to one hand only. “Any reason why you’re all the way over here, Mister Vantas? You’re awfully far from home for this time of the week.”

“Can’t a man take a fucking walk?” Karkat hisses, scowling. Terezi cocks an eyebrow.

“No need to get so testy. Did you come all the way over here to see _me_ , maybe? Or were you looking for Sollux?”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” Karkat grunts. “I’m going to the goddamn library.” He’s not, of course, but she doesn’t need to know that. Except she already does, and it’s obvious by the way that she laughs at him in response.

“Karkat, you don’t _read_. What are you yammering on about? You know you’re transparent. _I_ can see through you, and I can’t even see!”

“I can go to the library if I fucking _want_ to!” He spits, annoyed. Now he thinks he _will_ go to the library, just to spite her! How stupid she’ll feel when she’s gotten _two_ things wrong about him in one day! She’s grinning again, though.

“Oh, I know you can. But the point is that you _don’t_ want to. So why would you go?”

Karkat sneers up at her pointlessly, and she seems to know that he’s doing it. She tilts her head just a little, her hair falling to one side. She taps her fingernails against the arm of her sunglasses, and Karkat has to pull a cigarette out of his breast pocket in frustration, jamming it into his mouth unceremoniously. Terezi finally frowns when he lights it, and she sniffs affectedly.

“Ugh. You don’t need to be rude.”

“ _You_ don’t need to be a pain in my fucking ass.”

Her frown deepens, and she stands up fully, her chin out of her hands. She grips the window sill instead.

“I’m only ever teasing you, and you know that. Don’t be that way.”

“It’s fucking insulting! I don’t care what you _mean_ by it! I don’t have to stand for it! This is my dream, and my fucking livelihood! You have no right to be a cruel bitch about it!”

Terezi hesitates for a moment before she responds again, and for that one brief moment, Karkat’s anger quivers on the threshold of guilt, because she looks almost _hurt._ “…If I were any other woman, Mister Vantas, I’d be completely insulted and ask you if you kissed your mother with that mouth. But I know a man like you wouldn’t even _dream_ of kissing his mother at all, and if you did, you sure as hell wouldn’t care about how insulting you are to women who are just trying to have a little fun with you.”

“It’s never been fun for _me_ ,” Karkat growls. “I’d think you’d have noticed that by now, if you were so smart, but you and Captor are always way too fucking busy laughing in there with your fucking central heating to give a shit about how I feel, because it’s _funny_ to you when I lose my temper, for some ungodly reason that I’ll never fucking understand.”

“Oh, why don’t you just lighten up and quit being such a sore loser?!” Terezi shouts, frowning. A few people are watching the two of them from across the street, now. “Just because you couldn’t be a real cop doesn’t mean that you have to be so hateful toward us for getting what you wanted!”

“ _I AIN’T JEALOUS OF YOU ASSHOLES!!!_ ” Karkat snarls. People are definitely looking, now, some women covering their own ears or the ears of their children. “I’m fucking sick of you treating me like I’m a worthless piece of trash! Guess what?! I’m _NOT!!!_ I got my first real case today! A missing persons investigation! And you can’t fucking take that away from me!”

Terezi just looks confused for a moment when she realizes what he’s said. The hurt disappears long enough for her to give him a skeptical look, pushing her hair behind her ear uncertainly. “Missing person? We’ve probably already got it on file, then, Karkat, you should know that by now—”

“My client hasn’t _gone_ to the police! And you aren’t allowed to have this case, so don’t even think about telling Sollux and helping him try to find out who it is!”

“…But this could be an actual, serious crime! Karkat, I—!”

“ _NO!!!_ Now who’s the worthless one?! You and Captor go right on ahead and have fun doing all your fucking desk work and rescuing cats from trees, Terezi, I’ll be out here being a _real_ hero and solving fucking mysteries, alright? Have fun laughing at the goddamn private eye, because at least I’m doing something fucking useful with my life!”

“Karkat, this is definitely illegal—!”

“No! Back off, Terezi! You’re not taking this from me! Not you, not Captor…fucking _nobody!_ And don’t you even think about trying!” He points at her while he shouts, not even caring how futile it all is. When  he’s done, he puts his cigarette out on the ground and stomps off down the sidewalk, glaring at the people that get in his way as Terezi shouts after him about how they should really talk about this first before he goes off willy nilly, thinking that it’s totally fine for one uncertified individual to investigate a possible kidnapping, or worse. He doesn’t care to hear it. He snarls that he’s going to the library, and by the time he’s two blocks away and staring at the stone steps that lead up into it, he’s still angry enough to keep on stomping right up those steps and into the previously forbidden zone.

 _Kanaya will be proud when she hears about this_ , Karkat thinks distantly, and that’s enough to bring his scowl back up to a regular frown. She’s already done him one favor, today. Maybe she’s actually been doing him a second favor all these years by encouraging him to pick up a book and do a bit more reading when he has the time. It’ll soothe his nerves, she’s always saying. Now seems to be as good a time as any to test that theory.

 _It’s a quiet place to look over my notes, if nothing else_ , Karkat thinks, wandering into the building. It’s fairly small, but probably what Kanaya would refer to as “cozy”. It’s only one level as far as Karkat can tell, and it’s fairly easy to find an area where he can sit alone at a small table and spread his memo pad open without disturbing what few other people are there at four PM on a Thursday. He stares down at his notes uncertainly at first, flipping through them a few times before he leans one arm against the table and firmly plants his face in his hand. Kanaya gave him a list of names and contact information—friends of Aradia’s that Kanaya herself also knows—and then gave as much information about Aradia herself as she could. The things she likes to do, where she likes to spend her time: hell, what her hopes and dreams had been. _Are_ , Karkat has to correct himself, scowling. _This ain’t a murder investigation._ Yet. As much as Kanaya could recall, in hopes that something among it would aid in her safe return. The more Karkat looks at his notes, though, the more he realizes that he knows absolutel nothing about this girl, or how to even go about beginning this investigation. Isn’t it key to always know your subject, inside and out, before really digging into an investigation? Karkat has no idea. And mabe this is why this pity case from his old friend is the only real case that he’s ever had in his thirteen-month career as a private investigator. Failed cop. Whatever he is.

He stares at the contacts Kanaya listed, wondering if talking to any of them will help him to get a better feel for this Aradia girl. Feferi Peixes owns a flower shop on Beech Street. Nepeta Leijon is a waitress at a café on 12th. Tavros Nitram lives in a penthouse apartment on Cedar Avenue. A nice place, too…which is probably a good thing, since Kanaya mentioned that he’s more or less a recluse who was confined to a wheelchair in a tragic accident several years ago. If he lives in a place as nice as the apartments on Cedar Avenue, he’s probably a well-to-do gentleman: or at least, he probably was one before he had whatever accident paralyzed him so severely. Or maybe he’s old money. Whatever. Either way, he’s bound to be an interesting character.

Sighing, Karkat turns to a new sheet of paper in his memo pad and begins scribbling down a list of things that he needs to do, and the order that he needs to do them in. Every so often he’ll write Kanaya’s name down, just to remind himself that he needs to remember to keep her posted on the things that he discovers as he’s investigating…if he discovers anything at all. She _is_ paying him, after all. He needs to keep track of his hours, too, and carefully.

His pen stops scribbling, and Karkat stares down at the list he’s made. _It’s juvenile_ , he thinks, scowling. It looks like a shopping list. The more time passes, the more he’s starting to realize that he has no idea what he’s doing, and the more he’s beginning to understand that Kanaya has probably known this about him for many years and neglected to tell him. Even before he registered for the police academy. She must have known. Karkat runs a frustrated hand through his unkempt hair and grunts unhappily, feeling a nervous clenching sensation in his gut. Whoever and wherever this Aradia Megido girl is, he can only hope that she’s not dead, hurt, or worse. He, in all of his inexperience, is responsible for her life, now, and that responsibility is heavy as hell.


End file.
